They're among the best medical schools in the country. They're the top of
the top. And, as the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine likes to
point out, they don't encourage students to cut apart dogs, pigs, rabbits or
any other live animals as part of their course work.

Simulators work just as well, at least in the view of two-thirds of the
medical schools in the country.

So where do aspiring doctors still carve up animals? At the New York
Medical College in Valhalla for one. The school continues to use dogs for
its first-year students to operate on.

"This college like many other medical schools believes that it's the best
way to teach physicians, to use live animals in some circumstances," said
William Steadman, the school's vice provost and senior associate dean for
administration.

New York Medical College describes itself as a health sciences university
in the Roman Catholic tradition. It has 760 students enrolled in the School
of Medicine. The animal lab is part of a first-year course on physiology
that in the past has used about 15 to 20 dogs a year.

Its disagreement with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
is nothing new. Ten years ago, the same group called on the medical school
to stop using animals. Ten years ago the school answered the same way: The
labs, during which the dogs are sliced open so students can watch how their
bodies function, provide a hands-on experience that can't be duplicated.

The school seems to be on the losing end of the debate. However much New
York Medical College hangs on, most medical schools are abandoning the
practice. In 1985, nearly three-quarters of the schools used live animals.
Compare that to today. If the trend continues, the numbers could soon be
reversed.

This is not about using animals for research. Arguing that all animal
research should be eliminated — as the physicians committee also would do —
is more difficult. If to me it seems barbaric, to others it's the price we
pay for medical advances that will save human lives.

This is about training medical students, and with so many schools using
simulators, how do you justify killing these dogs. Because the dogs are
killed at the end of the training sessions.

Do they suffer? It depends on whom you listen to. The medical college
says the dogs are fully anesthetized. Opponents — including doctors from the
physicians committee — say there's no guarantee. Dr. John J. Pippin, the
group's medical adviser, said that when he was in medical school in the late
1970s at the University of Massachusetts in Worcester, his table botched its
task. Even worse, the dog was half-awake, he said.

It's not difficult to imagine. These are students after all, and they are
inexperienced. That's the point.

The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine has been accused of
being a front of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. (One of its
chief accusers, the Center for Consumer Freedom, is funded by the restaurant
and food industry.) The committee responds that it is a separate
organization. It does oppose using animals in testing. It does advocate
low-fat vegan diets. It has gotten money from PETA in the past, though it's
gotten money from other groups, too. The National Institutes of Health
partially funded its recent diabetes study that found a vegan diet did a
better job at glycemic control than one recommended by the American Diabetes
Association.

But all of this seems beside the point. Allowing medical students to
slice apart dogs is still gruesome, whoever's doing the objecting.
Especially if there are alternatives.

In June, the physicians committee wrote to 12 of the 19 schools it
believes still use animals and this time the group is trying to turn the
federal Animal Welfare Act to its advantage. The act requires that
laboratories reduce the use of animals when possible. The physicians
committee argues that because well established alternatives exist, animals
shouldn't be used at all.

As a result of the physicians committee's campaign, the U.S. Department
of Agriculture is sending inspectors to a number of medical schools,
including New York Medical College. An inspector already visited the Medical
College of Wisconsin. She notes in her report that regulations require the
college to justify why it has not substituted alternatives to live animals.
There are alternatives, she says. She found them.

New York Medical College last reviewed its use of animal labs two years
ago. It concluded that there was still no substitute for the sensory and
experimental components of the laboratory exercise.

Traditions die hard. Here's to a quick and painless death.

PLEASE CROSS POST - End Dog Lab at NY Medical

NY Medical College in Valhalla continues to conduct a dog lab, even
though a majority of other medical schools have phased out this inhumane,
unnecessary cruelty.

There are 126 medical schools in the nation; only 20 still offer dog
labs, and 19 of them make it optional, admitting that it is not essential to
learning the necessary information or skills.

During the dog lab, drugs are administered and the students touch the
dog's heart; the dog is then killed. Eight dogs are used. Students who opt
out are given dog data in place of the lab.

Harvard, Yale and Stamford do not use live animal labs. Simulators are
so superior that two insurance companies have started to offer reduced rates
on malpractice insurance to those who've been trained on simulators.

This is a contentious issue: NY Medical College held a panel recently
which included two 'op out' students, and two students who enjoyed the dog
lab. PCRM requested to send a doctor to present an alternative viewpoint,
and was denied. Only one M.D. actually got to speak, and he was pro dog
lab, so a fair and balanced forum was denied.

For this school to make this unconscionable choice in this day and age is
reprehensible. Dog labs are the most easily replaced medical 'teaching'
tools. To subject dogs, who feel pain and fear just like people do, to
unnecessary cruelty, is disgraceful. This teaches cruelty, as well - doctors
should conduct themselves, and treat others, with compassion. Please make
the following contacts which have been provided by Physician's Committee for
Responsible Medicine (www.pcrm.org):

Norman Levine, Ph.D. (914) 594-4105 This is the doctor who was at the
debate; he is the Physiology department coordinator.

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